the blog about mini moments of intention (and washing dishes)
As I’ve mentioned before, we have a toddler. Therefore, our kitchen is a mess, always. Well, with the exception of the five minutes after we’ve cleaned everything up, have not yet cooked another meal, (nor grabbed a snack for ourselves) and our toddler is out of the room (preferably asleep). If any of the previous things are NOT the case then you can assume our kitchen is chaotic.
There are just SO. MANY. DISHES. and SO. LITTLE TIME. Both my husband and I work full time and keeping a tidy house let alone kitchen has fallen very far down on our priorities list. Not that we don’t want one- who doesn’t?! If you’ve ever had the privilege to hire a professional cleaning service then you know that delightful feeling I get when I walk in the house and everything is CLEAN, TIDY AND ORGANIZED. I feel so happy and peaceful and calm.
Recently we’ve needed to tighten our family budget and so the luxury of a cleaning service is on pause, which means my husband and I are the cleaning service. Hence why the previously mentioned immense amount of dishes are ever-present.
This morning, I came downstairs and saw all of the dishes from last night (or let’s be honest, maybe all of yesterday and a little from the day before.) It was early in the morning and I went to get my coffee ready. I have a delightful Nespresso maker (that’s another little thing that makes a big difference!) that takes about 60-90 seconds to brew me a cup. Usually in that time I look at my phone: check slack, text someone back, read the news, go on YouTube, you know “get connected” with the outside world. But today I did something different. I decided to use the time to clean up a small section of our kitchen.
I put all the dishes in the sink, cleaned off the counter, sprayed it, wiped it and disinfected it. The coffee still wasn’t done, so I did the same thing to the kitchen table. By the time the delightful “crema” was on the top of my caffeinated elixir, about ⅓ of our kitchen was cleaned up! WHAT?! IN 90 SECONDS?! YES.
Later in the day, I had just put our son down to bed and was waiting for my watch to charge so I could do a home workout (lol the challenges of modern society, waiting for my watch to charge amirite?!) and I looked at the dishes and thought - let’s see what I can get done in 6 mins. I put a timer on my phone and got to work. Ok I did NOT get the entire kitchen spotless (I am not a power cleaner nor Super Woman) but I did get a majority of the dishes in the dishwasher, the recycling sorted and even some of the hand-wash dishes cleaned.
I thought about doing the rest of the kitchen, but I honored my commitment to myself to go workout and decided that I can always set another 6 min timer after dinner if I feel so inclined. (It is now after dinner and I do not feel so inclined ;-) )
This made me think about all of the small pockets of time in the day where I have a few mins here or there and I spend my time “feeling” productive but perhaps not actually doing what’s most important for my mental health and my family. Squeezing in one more email or “relaxing” with social media videos or quickly buying something online or scrolling and stressing about the news are all things I could’ve chosen to do with my time this morning. I may have felt like I had used the time wisely, but in fact, it wouldn’t have provided the same actionable result nor the small pride and peace I have in making my home a little bit nicer for myself and our family.
“Cleanliness is next to godliness”, isn’t that what they say? I don’t know if that’s true but I do know that I and most people feel a little more at ease when my space is clean(ish) and clutter-free.
So why is it that I’m writing about doing dishes this week? Well, what today showed me is that a small action (90 seconds!) can have a measurable uplifting effect. I’m sitting in my kitchen now, listening to the hum of the dishwasher and am feeling more serene than if I looked over and saw a huge pile of dirty dishes still waiting for me. It also reminds me that the fear of something BIG (doing all those dishes!) is actually much more painful than the truth (it’s just dishes) and the action (just doing the dishes). Yes it might not be fun, but it doesn’t have to be overwhelming either.
So my action for you today is:
Think of an activity that you have in your daily life with a small amount of “downtime” (i.e. waiting for the microwave to heat up your lunch, your laptop to boot up, a smoothie to blend waiting or your favorite streaming show to load)
When that activity next comes up- change what it is you usually do and try something else that is intentional and fulfilling and bonus points- helps others! (i.e. doing a few dishes)
See how you feel, what the results are in the moment and hours/days afterwards. What if you added 30 seconds next time? Or 3 minutes? What would be the impact of that?
Some ideas to try, beyond washing dishes include:
Squats, lunges, stretches, calf raises - some kind of physical exercise
Mindful breathing practice, body-scan, meditation
Sweeping one part of the room you’re in
Folding a little laundry
Cleaning up a few toys, books, gadgets
Organizing one drawer (or a section of a drawer)
Writing your partner, child or roommate a post-it note about why you appreciate them
Pet your dog or cat/animal of choice and notice how they respond
Step outside, feel the sun/rain/temperature and wave to a neighbor or notice nature
Say something kind to yourself out loud (seriously!)
See how these small purposeful acts change your day, and maybe even, someone else's!
I’ll be back next week with more little things… but I’d love to hear from you! How did you choose to spend your mini-moment? What did you discover? What surprised you?
